McLaren driver Lando Norris clinched his first Formula 1 title at the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Sunday.
Red Bull driver and defending champion Max Verstappen won the race with Norris placing third behind his McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri in second, which allowed Norris to finish two points ahead of Verstappen in the season-long standings.
Piastri was also in contention for his first F1 title and finished third in the standings, 13 points behind Norris.
Norris became the first British champion since Lewis Hamilton in 2020, and he also denied Verstappen a fifth straight title.
Now........for the facts and what is going to be an unpopular opinion to some but speaking the truths of how everyone else sees it..... Lando Norris is the most assuredly underserving champion in a long time. He was handed the title amid horrific team orders at the expense of his teammate due to disastrous team decisions and was still taken to the wire by a driver who was over 100 points down coming out of the summer break. Had there been one more race in the season, this would be a different story.
Anyone with an ounce of sense already knows that F1 is a money first entertainment spectacle, with the sporting integrity chipped away over the years as sponsorship cash and corporate interests grew. The series has always included pay to play drivers and wealthy backers with influence, but the open secret of the world’s premier motorsport has become too grotesque to ignore.
Is it even about being the best anymore?
Lando Norris is clearly a talented driver who belongs on the grid, but many fans struggle to place him among the current top five for raw ability. He developed a reputation as the supreme “bottler” for crumbling under pressure after taking pole, followed by the now familiar self deprecating “woe is me” narrative after falling short. Yet in F1’s TikTok era he has two very important things going for him. He is active on social media, and he is British.
Those are powerful assets for a driver in an England based team, broadcast by an English company, in a sport that seems increasingly interested in marketability over performance.
The Norris fandom has clearly permeated the upper levels of the sport’s coverage. Commentary icons Martin Brundle and David Croft struggled to hide their favoritism when Norris completed a technically illegal overtake on Yuki Tsunoda after the Red Bull driver moved under braking. You could feel their irritation through the screen as they urged the stewards to “make the right call,” even though Norris left the track to gain a position. In Mexico 2024, Verstappen received a ten second penalty for a similar offense.
All Four Tires Over the Line
It might sound nit picky, but this is the same sport that smugly disqualifies cars over a single millimeter of extra plank wear. Norris, however, escaped with no punishment despite all four wheels being off the track. For Norris, it took until McLaren had the fastest car on the grid before the same thing could be said about his championship hopes.
For F1’s new wave of Netflix fans, Oscar Piastri’s calm, monotone personality simply does not match the algorithm. There is no juicy narrative arc in the quiet achiever. If only Piastri streamed himself dancing with celebrities or shared emotional confessionals. He might have been champion today.
And that brings us to the obvious question.
Were McLaren favoring Lando?
Of course they were. He has been with the team far longer, and many within the organization believe he “deserves” the first McLaren championship since 2008. Meanwhile, Zak Brown has spent all year trying to control the narrative. He refused to declare a number one driver, despite famously saying we were “now in the Norris era.”
This outlet has documented the many times McLaren team ordered Piastri to move aside for Norris, sometimes even when Piastri was leading the championship. The simplest example is the three points he was told to give up at Monza. Those points are what got Norris across the finish line last night against Verstappen. The Norris crowd was thrown a bone, and it was clear who the F1 industrial complex wanted to win.
A bit later, Croft declared on air that “nothing we say in the commentary box affects what happens on track.” Even as favoritism filled the discourse, Brown faced the media with an unconvincing smile and earned a growing list of critics who were tired of the equality lie.
The problem is that when Piastri exploded out of the gates at the start of the season, the McLaren garage refused to accept that they might have hired someone faster than their long term favorite. The grand papaya plan had an Aussie shaped hole in it. Even while leading the championship by 34 points, there was nothing Piastri could do to convince his own team he was the one to back.
Did Norris outperform his rivals?
For most of this century, championships have been won by the best driver of the year, often by one considered an all time great. They have always benefited from dominant machinery, but rarely have we seen a champion who did not drive the strongest season.
In 2025, it is difficult to argue Norris was the best performer. Verstappen had the most wins and poles on the season, in a far inferior car. Norris took advantage of opportunities and made a late charge, but if he traded seats with Verstappen, he would likely be qualifying much further down the order. Nobody will claim he is better than Verstappen, and many will argue Piastri still has the edge in consistency and pressure handling, despite a few mistakes. Even in the final race with everything on the line, Piastri passed Norris on the opening lap. If team orders had not been against him all year, that move might have been far more meaningful.
It is hard to imagine Hamilton, Vettel or Verstappen conceding track position at the start of their own title deciders.
Piastri did have a few costly mistakes in the back half of the season, which conspiracy theorists claim were caused by foul play, but the bigger picture is simpler. He was a fierce, competitive underdog swimming against a tide created by his own team.
And then, almost quietly, the new champion confirmed one final detail.
Lando Norris will run the number 1 next year. The number is reserved exclusively for reigning champions. Verstappen has used it since 2021, choosing to run it through 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025. Norris typically uses number 4, but said the chance to carry number 1 is tradition, earned through hard work, and something the entire team could take pride in.
“It is not for me, it is for them as well,” Norris said. “It is their pride. They put in so much effort. It is not the same when you say we are number 4. They will be even happier than I am.”
Since 2014, F1 drivers have been able to choose career numbers. Lewis Hamilton is the only champion to decline number 1, preferring to keep 44. Verstappen previously raced with 33 before becoming champion, and it is unclear whether he will return to it.
Norris will roll into pre season testing with a new car, a new number, and a championship that many believe was shaped by more than lap time alone.